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This book "fills the unquestionable need for a comprehensive and up-to-date handbook on the fast-developing field of pragmatics" and "includes contributions from many of the principal figures in a wide variety of fields of pragmatic research as well as some up-and-coming pragmatists."

SUMMARYThis is a 241-page expansion of the author's dissertation containing eightchapters. Strategically, the book is aimed at demonstrating that ''variation isvariation'' irrespective of where we observe it, inside one language orcrosslinguistically. To accomplish this, the author employs syntacticconfigurations of inner aspect in English and compares them to those in otherlanguages, like Russian, Finnish and Bulgarian. He lays out the intricacies ofthe English aspectual system in careful detail and arrives at a number ofinteresting conclusions, for example, the independence ofObject-to-Event-Mapping (OTE) from event structure (ES), or the purely syntacticnature of accomplishments. In spite of the familiarity of the topic to manyresearchers, this work offers a fresh perspective on inner aspect. First, it hasa strictly minimalist orientation, which means no (neo-)constructionalistexplanations but a feature-based account of aspectual phenomena. Second, it paysattention to what seems to be obvious and in no need of special attention, thatis, it serves as a good example of a scientist's willingness to undertake anyamount of toil disclosing mechanisms underlying the workings of language.Unfortunately, there are portions of the book with which this reviewer does notagree.

Chapter 1. An Introduction to the Syntax of Inner Aspect.In this chapter MacDonald gives a short introduction to the syntax of inneraspect, presents some previous accounts, and sets the theoretical premises forhis investigation. He observes that in English the internal argument plays animportant role in the aspectual interpretation of the verbal predicate and namesthis property ''the OTE (Object-to-Event) Mapping''. Another important aspectualproperty is ES (event structure), which is a configuration of two features, (initial part of event) and (final part of event). In order to analyze theinteraction between aspectual interpretation and the direct object, the authoremploys Verkuyl's [+/-q] (quantity) characterization of noun phrases (NPs). Toanalyze event structures, he makes use of the Vendlerian classes of verbs:accomplishments, achievements, activities and states. Telic verbs have the feature and atelic ones do not. Accomplishments, achievements and activities allshare the feature, which is missing in states.

MacDonald shows that the OTE and ES properties are distinct: without aprepositional phrase the verb 'carry' behaves as an activity, that is, it has noOTE property (see (1)). When a goal PP is added (see (2)), 'carry' behaves as anaccomplishment with the OTE property.

2a. John carried a goat into the barn #for ten minutes/ in ten minutes. b. John carried livestock into the barn for ten minutes/ #in ten minutes.

Thus, ''the [q] property of the NP entering into the OTE mapping cannot be thesame property introduced by the goal PP; otherwise, the goal PP would not haveany effect on the aspectual interpretation of the predicate'' (p.5).

Presenting views by other authors (Borer, Ramchand, Harley, Travis), MacDonaldagrees with those who distinguish between the two properties of inner aspect andbetween achievements and accomplishments.

Chapter 2. The Syntax of Eventives 1.Here the author argues for the existence of an aspectual projection, AspP,between the little v phrase (vP) and the verb phrase (VP). AspP is independentof event structure, thus there should exist some languages where one of these isabsent. In the introduction MacDonald claims that Russian is such a language:its verbal system has no AspP.

The rest of the chapter is devoted to showing what effect the presence of AspPhas, where it must be located and how it can be separate from the eventstructure of the verb. The durative phrase ('for an hour') test demonstratesthe atelicity of the event on the single event interpretation (3) and itstelicity on the iterative interpretation (4). In the latter case the durativephrase also modifies the entire event: there is no end to it (p. 34):

3a. The worker carried the bag for an hour (3a, p. 33) b. John screamed for an hour (4a, p.33) c. The boy loved the girl for a year (5a, p.33)

4a. The farmer dragged a log into the barn for an hour [the barn is on someelevation and the log keeps rolling back down] (6a, p.33) b. The captain spotted a plain for an hour (7a, p.33)

The atelic (but not iterative) interpretation is also achieved via the Agreewith Asp relation: for example, the [-q]NP 'wood' agrees with and values Aspand the whole event is interpreted as atelic (pp. 43-44):

5. A kid dragged wood into a barn.

The iterative interpretation arises when a bare plural object (and it need notbe direct) moves to AspP. By doing so it introduces existential quantification,and then moves further above AspP to bind a variable inside the domain ofaspectual interpretation (p.54):

6a. A kid dragged logs into a barn. (54a, p.52) b. A kid dragged the log into barns. (55a, p.53)

Nothing above AspP can influence the aspectual interpretation of the predicate.External arguments cannot, so the little v projection that introduces them isabove AspP.

Chapter 3. The Syntax of Eventives 2. Event Features.In this chapter, in order to check which features are present in which eventtypes, MacDonald uses the 'almost' test and the 'it takes x time' test. Theseexpressions are sensitive to both edges of the event.

Accomplishments and achievements have both features, and , activitieshave only , and statives are featureless. Accomplishments and achievementsboth being telic, differ with respect to the feature configuration. Inaccomplishments the feature c-commands the feature, and inachievements they are introduced by the same head and cannot be in the c-commandrelation. This conclusion is prompted by different behaviours of accomplishmentsand achievements with 'almost' and 'it takes x time':

7a. It took Phil ten minutes to drink the pitcher of beer (2a, p. 64) b. Phil almost drank the pitcher of beer. (3a, p.64)

The examples with the accomplishments in (7) are ambiguous between a start-timeand an end-time interpretation. Achievements have only a start-time interpretation:

This chapter also provides the answer to the question posed at the beginning ofthe book: how to distinguish between the two properties, OTE and ES?

Chapter 4. A Lexical Derivation of Achievements.Here the author accounts for the achievement configuration. Achievements ariseas a result of a lexical process reminiscent of Hale and Keyser's conflation. Wealready know that the feature is carried by the aspectual head, whereas thefeature can be introduced by a number of other projections, including Vitself. MacDonald studies conflation verbs with an abstract preposition in theirstructure. The preposition carries and as it gets conflated with the verbalhead, the feature does as well. Both the V-head and the feature conflate withthe Aspectual head later on in the derivation, all of which takes place prior toentering narrow syntax under the premise that ''there is syntax in the lexicon''(p. 98). The problem of functional projections in the lexicon, like AspP, issolved by renaming the latter into VP.

To demonstrate the idea from a different angle, the author discusses idioms,among which only achievements can be found. Since an idiom is a kind of lexicalitem, the conclusion is: achievements are formed in the lexicon, whereasaccomplishments are constructed in syntax.

Chapter 5. Minimalist Variation in Inner Aspect.In this chapter the author speaks of intralinguistic and crosslinguisticvariation of inner aspect. The chapter opens with the discussion of Englishstatives vs. eventives, which can alternate as a result of adding or removingthe and features.

The main material for demonstrating crosslinguistic variation in inner aspect istaken from Russian, which, in the author's opinion, has no AspP. This is so, heclaims, because Russian (a) does not have the OTE mapping, and (b) has no SSE(sequence of similar events) effect. Russian has a deficient inventory of eventtypes, with accomplishments missing. Bulgarian, which is ''aspectually likeRussian'' (p. 166) is demonstrated to be different from Russian, for it has casesof OTE mapping and thus sometimes projects AspP.

Chapter 6. The Autonomy of Inner Aspect.In this chapter the author shows that inner aspect is independent of (a) case,and (b) lexical meaning and thematic relations. The language under scrutiny forpoint (a) is Finnish. It takes MacDonald three pages to solve the intriguingpuzzle of aspectual composition found in this language: When the internalargument is accusative, it agrees with Asp and the predicate is interpreted astelic. Partitive arises from an abstract preposition that blocks the agreementbetween the [q] feature of the noun and the Aspectual head, leading to theatelic interpretation of the predicate. Point (b) is supported by English andSpanish examples.

Chapter 7. A Consideration of Other Aspectual Facts.In this short chapter MacDonald considers such aspectual phenomena asresultatives, conatives and psych-achievements. He comes to the conclusion thatadjectival (John wiped the table clean (4a, p. 195)), prepositional (Fredtracked the leak to its source (3a, p. 195)), ''way'' (John insulted his wayacross the room (17a, p. 198)) and fake reflexive (Bill cried himself to sleep(18a, p. 198)) resultatives all contribute to the structure just likeaccomplishment PPs do. As for conatives, the preposition ''at'' merges directlywith AspP valuing its [-q] feature, which results in an atelic interpretation ofthe predicate. Psych-achievements are problematic because the [q] feature ontheir subjects seem to interfere with the aspectual interpretation of thepredicate, but MacDonald solves this problem, too, showing that Experiencesoriginate lower in the structure than Agents.

Chapter 8. The Syntactic Nature of Inner Aspect and Some Speculative Remarks.In this concluding chapter MacDonald summarizes his theory, speculates more oncrosslinguistic and intralinguistic variation, and discusses alternationsbetween event types, which are limited by the number of steps required to betaken for removing or adding the necessary features. Thus, the alternations a)between achievements and accomplishments and b) between statives andaccomplishments are not found to be due to the length of the derivational wayfrom the former to the latter and back.

EVALUATIONThe book is written in very clear language with transparent presentation ofideas and detailed argumentation for some of them. A number of importantassumptions are made: 1) event structure and Object-to-Event mapping are twoindependent aspectual properties; 2) iterativity is triggered by inherentlytelic predicates; 3) intralinguistic and crosslinguistic variation are phenomenaof the same order caused by different interactions of the same features. Twouseful tests for event edges can be cited from this work: ''almost'' and ''it takesx time''.

The strict well-structured system carefully built by MacDonald is, however, tooabstract and it makes him sacrifice data and precision to his theory. Chapter 5especially suffers from this problem. Therefore I will concentrate on evaluatingthis chapter.

To begin, I disagree with the majority of the claims made about Russian inChapter 5:

1) Contrary to the claim, Russian does have accomplishments -- the argumentationon pp. 164-165 that drinking a bottle of wine is a punctual event is ratherweak; in addition, the translation of ''almost'' into Russian should be ''chut' ne''(see (9)). With this correction the example on p. 164 behaves exactly likeEnglish accomplishments, being ambiguous between the start-time and the end-timeinterpretations:

9 Ja chut' ne vypil butylku vina. I almost drank.PERF bottle wine.GEN I almost drank a bottle of wine

The mis-translation of ''almost'' undermines MacDonald's test for event structureof imperfectives. ''Pochti'' in (30), p. 151 was intended to target only .However, his examples repeated here as (10) are uninterpretable to native speakers:

2) Trying to show that imperfectives are always atelic and cannot have aniterative interpretation with internal argument bare plurals, MacDonald statesthat the nouns in (11) (=(20), p. 147) can be interpreted as a group:

However, the noun phrases in (11) cannot have a group interpretation; Mary canonly eat one apple after another and read one extract after another. It is hard,at least for me, to imagine the books being all ''read at the same time.''

The author presupposes that all perfective verbs are telic without testing themproperly and disregards the two-level nature of the iterative reading, saying:''If a BP (bare plural) is to elicit an SSE (sequence of similar events)interpretation, then we expect it to do so with a verb in perfective form, sinceas we noted above, perfectivized verbs are telic.'' (p. 147). Here it would beuseful to remember that (im)perfectivity is the instantiation of OUTER aspect,which does not always have a one-to-one correlation with inner aspectcharacteristics. Thus, secondary imperfectives will be telic on the micro-eventlevel, which is reflected by their compatibility with the time span adverbials,but atelic on the macro-event level, which is seen from their compatibility withthe durative phrase:

12. Vanja vy-piv-a-l stakan piva za polminuty v techenije pervyx dvux chasov. V. out-drank-IMPER glass beer in half.minute in running first two hours Vanja drank a glass of beer in half a minute for the first two hours.

3) Russian statives present a problem for MacDonald as well: all imperfectiveshave the feature, but statives do not. This is because Imperfectives can beanything: accomplishments (see (12)), achievements (umirat' 'die'), statives(znat' 'know') and activities (rabotat' 'work').

Contrary to what the author says about Russian statives, they do take lexicalprefixes, thus alternating between statives and achievements.

4) Superlexical prefixes are shown to introduce the feature, but so high inthe structure that no telicity results. There are, however, only twosuperlexical prefixes that behave according to the author's claim, delimitativepo- and perdurative pro- (Borik, 2006). The rest are different: they are notcompatible with the durative phrase. MacDonald notices this fact only about theinceptive prefix za-, which makes him think that it must be lexical. This takesus to point 5:

5) Inceptive za- cannot be a lexical prefix. Note in (13) the difference betweenthe argument structure of the verbs with superlexical za- (a) vs. lexical za-(b), and in (14) examples of stacking of inceptive za-, which can even co-occurwith lexical za- (14c):

6) The Bulgarian examples in (61) and (62) on page 167 -- said to demonstratethat there are Slavic languages having AspP -- do not contrast with Russian,since it is not the direct object that makes the verb perfective (and thustelic), but on the contrary, perfectivity of the verb induces definiteness ofits complement NP. As a consequence, it requires the definite article on thenoun. In fact, (in)definiteness of the noun here just disambiguates theinterpretation of these borrowed biaspectual verbs (remontiraxa ''repair'' andarestuvaxa ''arrest''). Di Sciullo and Slabakova (2005) note that bare pluraldirect objects of perfective verbs receive a strong interpretation even withoutthe article.

Thus, Chapter 5 unfortunately fails to make one of the most important points forMacDonald: the existence of a language with no AspP. In fact, Russian is muchmore like English than he believes. With more research, the author would havearrived at a number of interesting conclusions without any harm to his maintheoretical assumptions, for instance, that Russian accomplishments behave likeEnglish accomplishments with respect to the ''almost'' test; or that Russianoffers the same alternations of event structure as English does, and has noachievement-accomplishment or state-accomplishment pairs. But the author seemsto have been misled by the idea that Russian has no Object-to-Event mapping,which is not quite true (and neither is the independence of event structure fromthematic relations in English discussed in Chapter 6). Accomplishments inRussian are more like English PP accomplishments, since the PP is the source oflexical prefixes. But MacDonald believes that attachment of lexical prefixestakes place in the lexicon, which automatically turns the verbs carrying theminto achievements, and he goes to great lengths to try to show this.

So, trying to follow the minimalist perspective in which ''less machinery isbetter than more'', MacDonald ends up doing the opposite, postulating theexistence of syntax in the lexicon, which, in my opinion, leads to redundancyand unrestrictedness. How many syntaxes can there be? And where is the boundarybetween the syntactic syntax and the lexical syntax? And what makes the verbdecide not to be an achievement and to exit the lexicon before the conflation ofan feature on P or V?

Another confusing characteristic of MacDonald's minimalism is the idea that can be introduced by Asp, V or P heads, where the actual choice of the ''featurecarrier'' looks fairly arbitrary.

As one final issue, take the analysis of the Finnish partitive, compared toEnglish dative prepositional phrases, like ''to his buddy'' in ''Fred talked to hisbuddy'' (p.176). What is the motivation behind the choice of this kind ofanalysis over a more traditional one (e.g., Kiparsky, 1998) where Partitive isanalyzed on a par with conative constructions?

The work contains some unchecked examples (Czech in (46), p.157, represented asRussian, or the Finnish verb (incorrectly) agreeing with the partitive subjectin (24a), p. 178) and incorrect quotations. For example, Pereltsvaig (2003), towhich he refers, does not claim that the number of denominal verbs in Russian islimited. These further undermine a promising investigation into the syntacticnature of inner aspect.

As a result, the monograph creates a theory which looks attractive and motivatedin the first two chapters, but as the story unfolds, it becomes more and more ofan abstraction.

ABOUT THE REVIEWER:
Eugenia Romanova is a lecturer of linguistic disciplines at the Institute
of International Relations, Yekaterinburg, Russia. Her PhD dissertation
written at the University of Tromsø, Norway, deals with the syntactic
derivation of prefixed verbs in Russian. Her scientific interests lie in
the domain of syntax and semantics of aspect and argument structure of
Russian verbs.